apsouthern posted:

And because I don't think for a second that Wikipedia won't take that page down the first chance they get, here's a print screen

That was really really well done. I'm doubly proud you put my hard translatory efforts *cough* in as well. If you were to submit that writing to some newspapers and magazines I think it would have a chance of being printed.

I almost wonder if it'd be worth obfuscating our use of "The Slender Man" on the forums so that google doesn't point here if people searched for it. At the moment googling "Slender Man" brings up an SA thread first hit.

Victor Surge posted:

5/24/95**

1994: Wilks Estate. One subject reported nothing out of the ordinary before taking photograph. Lower stairs area was said to be very dark. Subject states that after the camera flash she heard a sound like a watermelon being *unable to understand subject*.

5/25/93**

Subject unable to recall events after manor power failure. Unable to question other two identified subjects. Camera and film acquired from Gloria Cready, current resident of Woodview Mental Hospital and Psychological Rehabilitation Clinic. Film mostly uncontaminated despite mass of blood and human tissue present on camera. No positive ID on anomalous tall and slender subject. Facial blur caused by possible contamination.

6/7/93**

Early digital analysis indicates tall subject may have no eyes. Anomalies, previously thought to be film errors and flash artifacts, now thought to be appendages.

6/10/93**

Final identified subject reported missing along with other thirty-three patients and staff of Woodview Mental Hospital and Psychological Rehabilitation Clinic south wing.

6/18/93**

Further inquiry to cease immediately.
(see report No.3339-2)

Haha I spent the night at the Myrtles Plantation two months ago.. nothing was spooky about that mirror, but the entire night was full of violent banging and slamming from down stairs and I kept pushing the covers off only to feel them resting on my shoulder a few minutes later as I laid there listening to the demolition derby down stairs, hoping dearly that it was just staff paid to break poo poo all night.

I think there should be less pictures of this slender man and more stories and "evidence" of his persistence throughout history. I like the idea of a spirit, or demon, or aspect of the mind that manifests itself throughout history- a gestalt entity comprised of humanity's fear and isolation and a celebration of sin. Like The Rake, and other stories i recall of a man in a suit who appeared in people's dreams.

I also think the faux-engravings are outstanding- its that sort of subtlety that's needed in making something truly spine chilling. Less of this crap formula of "take an old photo and put a stick man in the background" and more engravings, unwitting meetings and encounters of this entity. Less is more, people!

Anyone ever heard of Padre Flaco? A friend of mine who used to live in Mexico told me a campfire story about him when we were camping a while back. It was mostly the generic forest monster stuff about creatures stealing children and stuff. Do you think a Mexican legend about a tall man wearing black robes like a priest who lives in the forest is a coincidence or part of a pattern?

Edit:
I think in some variations he wears a military dress uniform. I wonder if it actually wears different clothes depending on the observer.

Dr. Arbitrary fucked around with this message at Jun 18, 2009 around 18:39

Dr. Arbitrary posted:

Anyone ever heard of Padre Flaco? A friend of mine who used to live in Mexico told me a campfire story about him when we were camping a while back. It was mostly the generic forest monster stuff about creatures stealing children and stuff. Do you think a Mexican legend about a tall man wearing black robes like a priest who lives in the forest is a coincidence or part of a pattern?

Edit:
I think in some variations he wears a military dress uniform. I wonder if it actually wears different clothes depending on the observer.

I think he'd be different all over the world- but with some constant characteristics. Always described as a well dressed man with hollow eyes.

Dr. Arbitrary posted:

Anyone ever heard of Padre Flaco? A friend of mine who used to live in Mexico told me a campfire story about him when we were camping a while back. It was mostly the generic forest monster stuff about creatures stealing children and stuff. Do you think a Mexican legend about a tall man wearing black robes like a priest who lives in the forest is a coincidence or part of a pattern?

Edit:
I think in some variations he wears a military dress uniform. I wonder if it actually wears different clothes depending on the observer.

I would have to agree that TSM presents itself differently depending on its target. That would seem to indicate some type of telepathy possibly? An ability to read the mind of its victim, to know what type of image to project. Or maybe it simply studies the population that its hunting in and varies its camouflage accordingly.

We naturally will respond positively to a man in a black suit because generally if you've got a suit, you're a business man, worthy of respect. So in places like Mexico, where Catholicism is still very influential, it shouldn't be shocking that TSM would present as a Priest. And if you go back far enough into their history, soldiers were very prevalent and needed to be respected, so presenting as a soldier would be natural as well.

EDMONTON, Alta. - The RCMP is being called in to help with the ongoing investigation into the apparent kidnapping of an Edmonton photographer.
On May 5, the Edmonton Police Service received a call from a concerned neighbour, reporting strange noises coming from the home of Abigail Tuscone, 26. Officers attended the scene to discover signs of a struggle, but no sign of the young woman. Subsequent investigation led police to declare the situation a kidnapping.
According to friends and family of Tuscone, the professional photographer had recently been concerned that she was being stalked by an unknown man. This had included a report filed with police a week before her disappearance.
With few local leads, the EPS is now getting assistance from the Mounties, who intend to widen the search area through Alberta. Both organizations are still hopeful that Tuscone will be found alive.
Abigail Tuscone is described as Caucasian, 5'6" and 168 lbs., with brown hair and green eyes.Based on Tuscone's description and a photograph found in her home, her alleged kidnapper is believed to be a Caucasian male, bald, standing 6 feet or higher. He was last seen wearing a black suit and tie.
Police and RCMP are looking for any information or tips from the public about Tuscone and her apparent kidnapper. You can contact your local RCMP detachment, EPS or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS.(CTV Edm)(The Canadian Press)

Too many similarities to not be him. I couldn't find the picture she took of her "alleged kidnapper". I don't suppose anyone else might be able to dig it up?

Going with a wikipedia page up-front was probably a lot of fun... but not a good idea.

The right thing to do is establish web resources about the Slender Man first - conspiracy-theory web pages, etc. Then, after there's some cross-pollination and even interest from people outside SA, create a stub Wiki page that just links a source or two, and treats the subject from a skeptical/fact-based standpoint (use words like "myth", "alleged", and "conspiracy theory").

A page like that, that purports only to report on a fringe myth, would have been more likely to survive. An editing history with a lot of different editors, over a long period of time (rather than a goon rush), with multiple references added and removed and edited over time, would have made the page less likely to be deleted.

Now, of course, that's closed off; even if we did all of this, the history of the original page's creation and fast deletion as vandalism will serve as evidence against any future incarnation of the page.

...which is OK. I'm thinking we (me?) register slenderman.org, work on it (make it the typical disorganized, slightly unbalanced ranting style typical of the genre - just take a look at websites promoting HHO, 911 Truthers, crop circles, etc. for ideas), and then gradually over time add a selection of stuff from this thread, sticking to the top-quality examples (probably not the supposed secret texts from agencies we've never heard of - don't require someone to believe in an additional conspiracy theory just to accept this one, as that is an implausibility-multiplier). You could even address the subject from a skeptical-believer point of view, showing "obvious forgeries and fakes" on one page and "unable to discount" stuff on another, etc.

Do it very low-key for a while (a year or more) and eventually it'll creep into the 'net's culture, and even have a chance to attract the attention of lazy reporters who don't fact-check stuff.

Leperflesh posted:

Going with a wikipedia page up-front was probably a lot of fun... but not a good idea.

The right thing to do is establish web resources about the Slender Man first - conspiracy-theory web pages, etc. Then, after there's some cross-pollination and even interest from people outside SA, create a stub Wiki page that just links a source or two, and treats the subject from a skeptical/fact-based standpoint (use words like "myth", "alleged", and "conspiracy theory").

A page like that, that purports only to report on a fringe myth, would have been more likely to survive. An editing history with a lot of different editors, over a long period of time (rather than a goon rush), with multiple references added and removed and edited over time, would have made the page less likely to be deleted.

Now, of course, that's closed off; even if we did all of this, the history of the original page's creation and fast deletion as vandalism will serve as evidence against any future incarnation of the page.

...which is OK. I'm thinking we (me?) register slenderman.org, work on it (make it the typical disorganized, slightly unbalanced ranting style typical of the genre - just take a look at websites promoting HHO, 911 Truthers, crop circles, etc. for ideas), and then gradually over time add a selection of stuff from this thread, sticking to the top-quality examples (probably not the supposed secret texts from agencies we've never heard of - don't require someone to believe in an additional conspiracy theory just to accept this one, as that is an implausibility-multiplier). You could even address the subject from a skeptical-believer point of view, showing "obvious forgeries and fakes" on one page and "unable to discount" stuff on another, etc.

Do it very low-key for a while (a year or more) and eventually it'll creep into the 'net's culture, and even have a chance to attract the attention of lazy reporters who don't fact-check stuff.

A little EQ, a touch of reverb, slap on some compression and there. That'll get your dickbutt jiggling.

Cybernetic Crumb

I think a big key to success would be generating things that don't explicitly mention our pal SM. Lots of people have avoided that, and they tend to sound slightly better. Just common descriptions or themes. When a witness describes the "person" as a SM then it's just a bit too overt. That might be the best way to go. Let the conspiracy aggregation attempts be the one to give it a label.

Someone else brought this up but a Coast to Coast AM call is a good idea. If spread out over the course of a few weeks it would be a great addition. Small calls about little odd things. "I was camping and thought I saw a tree moving." But not "I SAW SM HE'S REAL HERE'S A BIG COMPLICATED EASY TO REFUTE STORY".

Leperflesh posted:

Going with a wikipedia page up-front was probably a lot of fun... but not a good idea...

I have to agree. I'm glad I got a chance to read it before it got deleted, but I couldn't help but think that the 20th century sightings segment was what caught the eye of the wiki police, since that stuff would be the easiest to debunk.

Somebody needs to call Coast to Coast sometime during Open Lines and tell George Noory about their experience with the Slender Man.

Slender Man needs a book/movie. Some sort of collection of documents and sightings in a Blair Witch/Diary of the Dead (but better) style would fit nicely I think.
All the work that's gone into this so far is incredible, especially those woodcuts GyverMac. I'm highly tempted to try my hand at something but my skills with Photoshop are limited and I'm slightly afraid that 'he' will find me.

Now if you'll excuse me I've got to stay awake for the third night in a row thanks to you guys.

I certainly hope you don't hook up with Henry Moore. He's actually too big for some women to handle, though most are incredibly satisfied.

July 13th, 1988

The body of Hilary Foster, age 32, was found high in the branches of a tree in an Oregon state park near Monmouth. Her body was described as "twisted". Hilary's camera, found hanging around her neck, contained the above picture. It was the last taken before her death. According to her husband, Hilary took their daughter Stephanie and two friends to the state park for an afternoon of fun on the river. The three girls: Stephanie Foster, Jill Baker, and Amanda Harwood are still missing.

About two or three years ago, a film school friend of mine, Alex, was working on his first "feature length" movie. It was called Marble Hornets and I think it was about a twenty something returning to his childhood home and recalling events that happened there. It was pretty pretentious film student fare, but I helped out for a few days before my summer classes started, and a few rare occasions after that. Everyone on the set seemed pretty excited to be making it, especially Alex. The set itself was about half a mile away from Alex's house, roughly a thirty minute drive away from where I lived at the time. It was a pretty heavily wooded area, I guess to give it a sparsely populated small town feel. Most of the movie took place outside.

After about two months of off and on shooting, Alex dropped his pet project completely. It was really sudden when he let me know about it. When I asked him why, he told me it was because of the "unworkable conditions" of where he had picked to shoot. Which struck me as very odd since he had been living around that area since he was eight, and never seemed to have a problem with it. What's even stranger is that he acted incredibly distant when telling me this news. Soon after, he started avoiding me and from what I hear, everyone else. All he did was sit around his house.

Being a film student as well, I hated to see his work go to waste and decided to talk to him about it a bit more. A few weeks after he had stopped shooting, I finally convinced him to let me come over.

Something about him was worse than I'd originally thought. He had lost a good bit of weight, and looked pretty sickly. I pretended like I didn't notice and we just hung out for awhile. Right before I left, I asked him about Marble Hornets and what he was planning on doing with all of his tapes of raw footage. With almost no hesitation, he simply said "burn them".

This caught me off guard. When I asked why he didn't just archive them for B-roll in future projects, he just said he never wanted to work with the footage again. He was completely serious about this. I couldn't understand why he'd just want to get rid of it completely. Surely it wasn't all that useless. So I asked if I could take a look at them.

He agreed, but only under the circumstance that I never bring them back to him, and never discuss what was on them with him. He also highly discouraged me from showing any if it to anyone else. I laughed at this, and said that he must have accidentally made The Ring or something with the way he was talking. He didn't acknowledge this and brought me up to his attic, where he was storing the pile of tapes.

There were tons of them. He grabbed a couple of plastic shopping bags and piled the tapes in and gave them to me, then shooed me out of the attic. Right as I was walking out the door, he said, in the most serious tone I've ever heard from someone, "I'm not kidding, don't ever bring this up around me again."

Alex's comment was so sudden that I didn't have time to react before he had closed the door on me. He transferred to an out of state school soon after that and I haven't seen him since.

I filed the tapes separately from my others, and was honestly too freaked out to look at them at the time, and eventually forgot about them. But reading about the slender man has peaked my interest again. Maybe it's what Alex was talking about that day.

I've decided to begin going through the tapes later tonight. If I don't do it now, I probably never will. I'm hoping all I find is an unfinished student film and nothing else. That would sure put me at ease now that I'm thinking about it again.

JossiRossi posted:

I think a big key to success would be generating things that don't explicitly mention our pal SM.

This would be brilliant. Creating a "weird woods, please contribute" website with a lot of silly Elf and Capricorn sightings as a start would be optimal. Then slowly let it degenerate to a massive Slender Man site in a few month.

Blaster of Justice posted:

This would be brilliant. Creating a "weird woods, please contribute" website with a lot of silly Elf and Capricorn sightings as a start would be optimal. Then slowly let it degenerate to a massive Slender Man site in a few month.

Subtlety is definitely the way to go. A few people will initially buy into the idea of Slender Man or at least consider the possibility of SM's existence. As more information and evidence of Slender Man is introduced, more and more people will look into the myth due to its increasing notoriety.

For the SM mythos to spread successfully however, we need to come to some general consensus on the appearance of SM. Some discrepancies are ok and add to the creepiness of the Slender Man and could be used as 'fakes' (The more popular myths will always attract imitators) to add to the authenticity. If not, at least some reasoning behind SM's fluctuating appearance should be decided.

I'd also be quite eager to see SM's history and M.O explored in more fiction, again I'm really tempted to work on something myself but I'm really not that creative so I'm sure someone could come up with something better.

Sorry for ranting on but this could go very far as its already popular within this thread and if handled right could spread like a proper urban legend.

EDIT: Just read Daniel K and ce gar's posts. I've had a similar experience where a friend videotape myself and other friends in the woods (I kid you not unfortunately) and took his video camera home. The next day he refused to let us see the footage. It could be for several innocent reasons but he was deadly serious when he refused and now either pretends that he doesn't remember what we're talking about whenever we bring it up. (Or maybe he genuinely doesn't remember, who knows.) But anyway ce gar your story sounds intriguing and I for one would be really interested to know what you find on those tapes.

When we were little my brother and I used to hear weird clawing noises on the roof outside of our window. One time we heard them following a heavy snow, and we snapped a picture of some strange tracks the next morning.

Warm und Fuzzy posted:

When we were little my brother and I used to hear weird clawing noises on the roof outside of our window. One time we heard them following a heavy snow, and we snapped a picture of some strange tracks the next morning.

The backstories have been working well so far because they talk about things without explaining them, it's sort of along the lines of House of Leaves in that way.

Warm and Fuzzy, have you read about the rash of Jersey Devil sightings along the Delaware River in the early twentieth century? Your image brought it to mind: wiki, under the Encounters section in the lengthy 1909 entry.

unable to properly describe what happened, i was submitted to solitary psychiatric observation. I don't really remember what happened for most of the time I was there either, but i remember more questions. When i was released, i did my best to forget the whole thing, but I just couldn't. Then, three years later, a man arrived at my door. He said he had been a worker at my psych unit, and needed to see me. He had present at all of my "sessions," and that he had kept something that was mine. It was supposed to have been confiscated at the end of my evaluation with my other drawings in the file, but he said he knew he needed to save this for me, so that I would know for certain what happened. Without another word, he let himself out, and left me staring at that paper for hours. The next day, he was found dead in his apartment. The death was never investigated. I still don't know if it was a coverup, or if "it" came for him. But I am sure that I cannot sleep or will not wake up. I cannot leave. i can hear the waiting noises just outside. All i can do is wait, and return to this damned drawing, and wonder...